As we celebrated the nation’s birthday, I asked myself a patriotic question: Does the United States still lead in tech? As an American myself, my lens is inevitably distorted. Even so, the answer is hardly an unqualified yes.

I agree. While I still think the USA leads the question is debatable in various fields and as I have said before the future looks to be moving in the other direction. This is more due to the rest of the World improving than the USA failing. The continued reduction in advanced science and engineering degrees awarded to USA citizens compared to the rest of the world is a leading indicator I believe. Along with my belief that we will attract fewer leaders to the USA than we have in the past.

No other country can duplicate the American environment of tech creativity, which arises from a unique stew of entrepreneurs, academics, engineers, imaginative marketers and savvy financiers packed together in an atmosphere of risk-taking and plentiful capital. There is nowhere outside the United States remotely like the three places where this formula is most clearly at work – Silicon Valley of course, plus Austin and Boston.

True but the precursors for doing so are being created, the question is whether countries can pull all of it together. If only one country had a shot, I would guess that they would fail, because it is a difficult thing to do. But given how many places have a chance (including: China, Japan, UK, Singapore, France, India, Germany, Korea, Canada, Finland…) it seems very possible other centers of such excellence will appear. I must admit I would not put Austin in such a class, but maybe I am uninformed…

The most critical issue to remember from an economic perspective is having entrepreneurial engineers can drive economic growth and pave the way for many others to have great job and great investing returns in their company…

As I have said many times the economic future will be greatly influenced by science and engineering. Those countries that succeed in creating a positive economic climate for science and engineering development will find economic rewards those that fail to do so will suffer…

I believe that education will be the pivotal topic on which this debate will continue. If we wish to see teams of inspired scientific experts pioneering new bold tech projects in the future, we need to invest now in science degrees and other further education. There simply isn’t enough incentive at the moment for students to take this crucial subjects.

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